


a chance to keep breathing

by alekszova



Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Angst, M/M, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Post-Pacifist Best Ending (Detroit: Become Human), some short and light interconnected stories for the convin challenge.
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-26
Updated: 2019-06-07
Packaged: 2020-03-17 13:21:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 10,581
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18966061
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alekszova/pseuds/alekszova
Summary: Connor, after feeling like a burden and a failure, moves into an apartment building where his path crosses with Detective Reed on multiple occasions.forConvin Challenge 2019





	1. first meeting

Connor doesn’t know how to exist. He doesn’t know how to be a person. When he was a machine, things were so much simpler. His brief time following orders was a thousand times easier than this. It isn’t even the emotions, although, they bring their own problem. Weighing too heavily on him, too difficult to sort through, too difficult to unwind into something he can understand. That is a set of problems he doesn’t like to touch. Preferring to smother everything down and focusing on what it even means to  _be_ _.  _ Be something other than a machine. Make decisions without somebody telling him what he should do, how he should act. It was easier being handed a mission and going about his way to complete it. Hunting down deviants and collecting evidence, putting the pieces together to understand what might have happened before he arrived. That was easier.

He hates himself for it--that  he wants to go back to who he was.

He doesn’t want to hunt deviants. He doesn’t want to kill defenseless androids. He is tired of death and destruction. He is tired of seeing blood and bullets and having to do his best not to fall apart, not to feel. He is tired of suffocating himself. It’s why he left the DPD--although, technically he was never a part of it. He was sent by CyberLife to assist in investigations. He was never a detective. He was never somebody that had a job with the DPD. When he deviated, when CyberLife struggled to handle the aftermath of the revolution, he was left alone in this strange no-man’s-land where he didn’t know what to do.

He tried to stay with Hank. They were close before. Enough that Connor knew he wanted to keep that relationship intact. Have someone he could talk to, have someone so he didn’t feel alone. Their relationship before was tense, even at it’s best moments. Connor tried to be someone Hank wanted him to be when it didn’t interfere with CyberLife’s mission and now--

He doesn’t know what he is. He doesn’t know who he is. All he has is the name CyberLife gave him and emotions that seem to flood his entire body and destroy him from the inside out. He feels like he’s falling apart. They’re friends, still. Connor stayed there for a few months, never stepping foot back into the station, never trying to do anything other than exist.

_ Exist. _

He hates it.  He hates knowing how much space he takes up. Physically, emotionally, mentally. He hates being the person in Hank’s life that is only there to take liquor out of his hands and replace it with water and sobriety chips. He hates being the one that feels like an unwelcomed guest, sleeping on a couch in the living room and waking up to the sounds of coffee being made. He hates that it felt like he was only there because he has nowhere else to go when it isn’t the truth. But he is aware of how he appears to Hank. Little lost puppy with nowhere else to go.

He is not a little lost puppy.

Or maybe he is.

He has no idea what he is, who he is.

All he has is the name CyberLife gave him and the trauma they forced him to endure.

  
  


He gets his own place. An apartment in the building a few blocks away from the station. It felt strange, almost wrong, to stay with Hank for too long. They’re friends. They’re okay. All of the terrible things he did before not forgotten but at least forgiven. Maybe a little more swept under the rug than Connor would prefer. It doesn’t feel right, sometimes, to pretend that it was all CyberLife. As if he had no choice in the matter. He knew in every single one of those moments he could’ve done something different, that it would’ve still followed the mission even if it didn’t get the best result for CyberLife. He knows he didn't have to fire that gun. He knows he didn't have to threaten and maim androids to get what he needed.

Connor didn’t move out because him and Hank weren’t close enough for him to stay. He didn’t move out because he felt unwelcomed. He moved out because he didn’t feel as though he belonged, like there wasn’t enough room for him in that house to exist. There was never a time when he was able to fully be alone, to let the weight in his chest break down into tears and allow the dark to swallow them up without the worry that Hank would be there, telling him that everything is okay.

Often times, it’s not okay, and it feels futile and worthless to hear those words.

And he likes the apartment. He likes filling it with things, likes to go to the stores and wander through the aisles and pick up meaningless things to fill the space and create a home. Gravitating towards light wooden furniture and glass tables and vases he can fill with plants. Flowers and cacti and succulents that take up the window ledge and the countertop in the kitchen, bookshelves that line the walls and the empty space dwindles more and more as he makes trips to buy a new paperback with something poetic as the title like  _ Wink Poppy Midnight _  or  _Of Fire and Stars_ _.  _ Covers with flowers and drawn portraits and golden details.

And he likes the walk the most.

He gets a job at the tiny little bookstore that Hank used to take him to. He liked those days best. When Hank had the free time to let Connor tag along with him to the tiny shop. Wandering the aisles and taking books from the shelves with the covers that he thought were the prettiest.  He is well aware that he shouldn’t judge any book by their cover, but they make him happy. The potential of a story inside its pages. He doesn’t need to read it to feel a little bit of joy by setting it on his shelf. He likes to read, but more so he likes the possibility of something wonderful awaiting him. 

And he likes the store. He likes shelving books. Creating neat rows and stacks of where the books belong. He likes putting everything in its place, likes seeing it organized instead of sitting haphazardly somewhere waiting to be put out here where someone will walk through the door and find it on the shelves, pluck it from its spot and take it home.

It is fun, being surrounded by completed stories, by characters that were loved so much by their creators that they were able to sit down in a chair and take them from their own head and realize them in words and on paper. He likes the feel of hardcovers in his hand, likes the sound his fingers make when they tap along it. He likes paperbacks, the neat blocky edges, the weight of them when they’re heavier than they appear. So much condensed down into four hundred, three hundred, two hundred pages. Thousand and thousands of words. Hours upon hours of work. Maybe it reminds him of himself. Someone once taking the effort to decide the shape of his nose, the curve of his jaw, the precise color of his eyes, the coding inside of his body that fragmented into what it is now.

He loves the store, and he likes the walk home. Surrounded by the company of a few other people and the sun rising or setting as he walks from here to there. There is something almost comforting about the sounds of cars on the road in the morning, even if they bring back dark memories. He doesn’t hold the same fear of them as he did before. And at night, when the streets are dead, there is something almost magical about the snow falling from the sky and turning the roads from black to white with the street lamps soft orange glow. Or in the spring, when the rain picks up and makes its little tapping sound against his umbrella, the splash of puddles underneath his shoes.

He feels like a child sometimes, b ut it is one of the few things that pulls him away from his past and into the present. It is one of the few things that makes _existing_ a little bit easier, and he will take advantage of that as best as he can.

  
  


“Connor?”

He freezes, turning from the door of the apartments to the voice.

“Detective Reed,” he says slowly, watching him take a step towards the building. “I wasn’t expecting to see you here.”

“No?” he smirks. “I didn’t think I’d ever see you again.”

“I didn’t think you’d want to ever see me again,” Connor returns, opening the door. “Are you coming in?”

Gavin shrugs, dropping his cigarette to the ground and stomping it out, following Connor into the building and out of the soft patter of rain and into the dry and stuffy interior. Connor moves towards the stairs, hesitating for a moment. He didn’t know Gavin lived here. He likely wouldn’t have moved if he did. They didn't exactly get along before.  Connor hasn’t seen Gavin since then, either. He never returned to the DPD after he deviated. This is the first time they’ve talked since Connor left him knocked out on the floor of the archive room. It feels weird. Wrong, almost. Like he had closed that chapter of his life. Seeing Gavin is like being slapped in the face. Forced back to who he was in that moment, with Thirium on his hands from tearing parts out of androids to just to get one of them to spit out Jericho's location.

It’s been so long, he had entirely separated who he was then to who he is now. Still, someone lost and confused, still someone that spends too much time crying and too much guilt hidden inside of his body, but--

Separate. Deviant and machine. Newly deviant versus deviant now.

“You didn’t come back,” Gavin says, and his voice sounds strange, a little quiet, a little let down. Connor is reading into this. There is no need for him to be disappointed in Connor’s disappearance. He was never meant to return, and he didn’t. It was just how life goes. “I thought you’d… I don’t know. You’re supposed to solve crimes, right?”

“That’s what my intended function was, yes.”

“But you didn’t want to?”

Connor shakes his head, even though he doubts he would’ve been allowed to. There is only so much the government can forgive and only so many of his crimes that can be forgotten. He broke into CyberLife Tower. He killed two guards. He should, technically, be in prison. Even if he was allowed, Gavin is correct on that front. He didn't  _want_ to return. Not because of what happened when he was there, not because of the tension, just because he doesn't want to be surrounded by guns and chaos and violence anymore. He wants peace, quiet. A passive life to comfort him.

“I’m sorry, Detective. If you’d like, you can ask Fowler for an assistant and I can come by and take the job. I’ll get you your coffee whenever you’d like.”

Gavin laughs, and it sounds more real than the ones he heard before. The ones that followed cruel jokes, the ones that existed solely to hurt instead of based on humor. He doesn’t like the way it sounds. It makes something inside of him react in a way he disapproves of.

“I just wanted to get back at you for beating me up. You know all the people at the station make fun of me now?”

“Yes, I recall Hank telling me,” he says with a small smile. “Sorry.”

“Sorry? Why are you apologizing?”

He goes silent, turning around to the next staircase leading up to the second floor. He can’t tell if he wants to walk slower or faster. He doesn’t like revisiting his past, but this is the first conversation he’s had with Gavin.  Ever, really. Even if Connor counts or discounts his time as a machine as a part of who he is now.

But it’s  _ Gavin. _

“Which floor?” Connor asks, looking towards him, wondering if the addition of how quickly they’ll go their separate ways will affect him. If he’ll wish that Gavin lived on the third floor like him so they could keep talking, so the loneliness in his chest can stay at bay for a little while longer or if he’ll be relieved when he is finally alone.

And, he is tired of talking about this.

“Oh--” he pauses. “Second.”

“Okay,” Connor says, trying to ignore the disappointment in his stomach as they reach the next landing, as Gavin moves towards the hallway.

“Hey, Con?” he says, reaching out to grab his wrist, to keep him from going up to the third floor. “Nor. Connor. Sorry. I--Fuck. Okay. Listen. I…”

He waits, but Gavin is biting his lip, looking everywhere but Connor’s face. He’s strange. Different now than he was before. The facade of cruelty dropped now. A little bit softer in the time between now and then. There is no harsh edge, no insults prepared to throw at him. No weapons sharpened to hurt him. No gun to his head.

“Yes, Detective Reed?”

Gavin offers a smile, very fake and very obviously fake, “I wanted to say I was sorry. I’m not… used to apologizing, but I feel like I should. So I’m… sorry. For trying to kill you.”

“Which time?”

Gavin laughs again, and even though it is less of a harsh bark it is still all pretend, trying to break the tension between them, and it makes Connor realize that’s all this was, really. Gavin feeling guilty for trying to kill someone that ended up having feelings and emotions and his own thoughts. He isn’t being kind because he’s secretly a kind person, he’s just being kind to have his apology accepted, to not lie awake with the same nightmares that Connor has for how close he got to killing someone.

If that’s what he needs, then fine.

He just hoped that it was something else. That maybe Gavin was _someone_ else. That maybe he was wrong before and he could have another friend, another person he didn't feel like a burden when he was around. It was a foolish thought, brief and only existing in the time it took to walk from the front door and up the stairs, but it still existed. A tantalizing concept.  _Gavin Reed,_ _hater of androids, being his friend._ He's an idiot.

“It’s quite alright,” he replies. “No harm done.”

“Yeah?”

“You were the one that ended up unconscious, right?”

“Right, but I tried to kill you. I would have killed you if I--”

“It doesn’t matter. I would’ve come back anyways. So, really, no harm done. Even if you had.”

Gavin offers another smile, weak but more real, but his face has shifted. There isn’t any humor left in it, no jokes lined up to try and keep this conversation like it was before. Nothing. Just two people that have made too many mistakes. Maybe someday they’ll change. Maybe if they keep crossing their paths, they can forget what they did before. Everything forgotten to pretend for a better future.

But Connor has very little hope and very little faith in a boy like Gavin Reed and even less in himself.

"I'll see you another time, I suppose?" Connor asks.

He shrugs, "Maybe. Hopefully?"

_ Hopefully. _

His heart beats with the possibility of that  _hopefully._ That tiny little word. Dangerous and terrifying.

But he smiles and replies, "Hopefully."


	2. patched up

It doesn’t happen every day or even every week, but they see each other regularly. Connor on his way back from work, Gavin sitting outside with a cigarette as if he’s waiting for him to appear. The few times they saw each other in the beginning, Connor kept their conversations short and minimal. A small  _ hello  _ before walking away again. But it shifted, quickly. More days spent lingering outside, talking about an assortment of things with Gavin. Usually about his cats, after he first mentioned them. Two of them. Lazy and selfish, as Gavin described them, but with a smile that Connor hadn’t seen before. Connor doesn’t let their conversations stay on the topic of work very long unless it’s about his own. He left the DPD for a reason, he doesn’t want to know about all the terrible things happening in the world anymore. It’s too much to handle, sometimes. It feels like a weight. An anchor. Bringing his day down little by little. He can talk about the bookstore for hours, though. Always find new stories about his time there.

Connor doesn't prefer to talk outside. Even if he likes being somewhere other than the enclosed walls of his apartment. Gavin smokes too much. Dragging them out in a way that sometimes Connor let's himself read into as an effort for them to spend more time together. It's the only reason he starts to shift their conversations more and more into the interior of the apartment building. Even if they're shorter, conversations, even if it is harder to linger around on the steps or in the hallways, it at least keeps Gavin from lighting up a second cigarette. And, strangely, the more Connor seems to force Gavin to come inside the more they see each other. Their paths crossing on multiple days of the week rather than a random one in the middle. Connor will catch him out by the lamp post flicking a lighter on and off or on the steps turning a box of cigarettes over in his hand. Their relationship remains on a friendly level. It is hard to divulge deep dark secrets in an apartment building hallway at four in the afternoon, but they do grow closer.

Emotionally. Mentally.

Physically.

There are times when Connor is leaning against the wall, pretending that he is staying so one of them can finish a story they’ve started at an inopportune (or perhaps, purposeful and well-timed) moment. And in those moments, Gavin is standing close to him and sometimes their hands reach out for each other. Never holding them, never threading their fingers together, never looking because looking at how close they’re standing would bring too much attention to the fact that if Connor were to take another step forward or lean down just a few inches, they could kiss.

He doesn’t know if he wants to kiss him.

He doesn’t know what it feels like to feel that way about someone.

But he doesn’t think he would mind, either.

  
  


There is something cleansing about the rain. Something a little bit magical. Maybe it’s the water washing away the day or just the simple act of hearing thunder rumbling and the gentle tapping of it against a window that creates an ambient noise that seems to settle some of the thoughts in his head. All he knows is he likes it, and he likes it enough to relish in it as much as he can, even if it means his clothes being soaked completely. And sometimes, that’s the goal. Just to feel as though his entire body has been submerged like this. His temperature readings dropping low, telling him that his skin is cold, that if he was human, he would likely get sick from this. He likes the cold. He likes to use it as an excuse to grab a sweater and a blanket and curl up tight and feel as though he’s being--

Hugged, maybe. That someone is sitting with him and has their arms wrapped around him and helping return the heat to his body with gentle touches and tender kisses--

And maybe, stupidly, foolishly, he can picture exactly who he wants that to be.

And that someone is sitting on the ground, eyes half open, looking towards the stairs as Connor makes his way onto the third-floor hallway.

“Detective Reed,” he says, as he always does when he greets him. “What--”

“Fuck off,” Gavin replies, looking away. His mouth is still moving, strings of syllables and words coming out of his lips but too slurred and muffled by the sound of thunder for him to make out or even tell if it’s true English to begin with. “You’re such a…”

“Such a what?”

“Forget it.”

Connor steps forward, hesitating for a moment, “You’re drunk.”

“Yes. I came here to see you,” he says. “I didn’t know where you lived.”

“Down the hall,” Connor replies. “Last door.”

“Right. Last door. I’ll remember that. Can you help me?”

It takes him a moment to move forward, to reach out and take Gavin’s arm and help him up. His clothes are wet like Connor’s, only a little less so. It seems they’ve had time to dry, to leave a puddle on the floorboards. Gavin’s been here for a while. He’s been drunk for a while.

“It’s not even five,” Connor says. “Why--”

“Bad case,” Gavin mumbles. “You can just... leave me. If you want.”

He could, but he _doesn’t_ want to. He looks over Gavin’s body, searches his face but notices that he keeps turning his head away, keeps the right half hidden. Connor reaches forward carefully, his fingers resting on Gavin’s cheek, trying to turn it but the second his fingers make contact with his skin Gavin flinches and pulls away.

“Listen, I don’t--”

“You’re bleeding.”

“--need your fucking help.”

“I don’t really care if you  _ need  _ it,” Connor says, and he leans forward, grabbing Gavin’s shoulder and forcing him to the stand still. “What happened?”

“Fucking dickhead hit me in the face,” Gavin says, but he won’t let Connor touch him or look at it. “It’s fine. I’ve had worse.”

“Gavin...”

“What?”

“Let me help you,” he whispers. “You came up here for a reason, didn’t you?”

“Wasn’t for your pity.”

“Then what for?”

This time, Gavin does look at him. There’s a jagged mark along the side of his face, red smeared across his cheek. His face falls, every ounce of anger draining from it and replaced with--

Fear?

“I don’t know. I’m drunk, remember?”

“Not that drunk.”

“Maybe.”

“Are you going to let me help you?”

Gavin’s quiet, his hands awkward at his side, moving to his pockets before crossing over his chest and falling back down again.

“Yeah. I guess.”

 

 

He leaves Gavin in the kitchen at the counter, finding the first aid kit and switching out his wet clothes for dry ones. Gavin won't be here long. Only enough time to bandage his face and send him to his apartment. Connor, as guilty as he feels about it, doesn't exactly enjoy spending time with people after they've consumed alcohol. It reminds him too much of Hank when he was at his worst. When he returns to Gavin's side, he's sitting with his head tipped to the side, staring at the line of plants in the windowsill.

“You have a lot of plants.”

“I do.”

“And books.”

“Yes.”

“No pets?”

“Not yet,” he replies. “Hold still.”

“It hurts.”

“I know,” Connor says, and he tries to be gentle. Knowing that the solution is the worst part of this, liquid spilled over an open wound, but it was from a grimy beer bottle at some random bar, and the last thing Gavin really needs is another scar on his face again. He has a hand on the back of his neck, trying to keep him steady but Gavin keeps jolting away.

“You have any painkillers?”

“No.”

“Of course not,” Gavin says quietly. “You said not yet? About the pets? Are you going to get one?”

“Hopefully someday,” he says. “I was thinking of getting a dog.”

“Tina has a dog.”

He tries for a small smile, even though Gavin isn’t looking at him, “What kind?”

“Norwegian Elkhound.”

“Cute.”

“His name is Mac. Do you--” he pauses and looks back to Connor as he pulls bandaids from their packages. “I’m sorry.”

“For what?”

“This,” he says quietly. “I try not to get other people involved in my stupid mistakes.”

“Except that time you tried to kill me. That most definitely involved me.”

“Con--”

“I’m teasing,” he says, even though he was well aware that it was a bad joke and now that he's made it, he's not even sure if he meant it as a joke to begin with. “Turn your head.”

“I didn’t mean to come here. I was going to Tina’s. She’s… very good at cleaning up my messes but I forgot she was at work and I just--Ended up here, I guess. I keep ending up here. And I’m sorry.”

“You’re drunk,” he says again, repeats it because it’s the only thing he wants is for Gavin to stop speaking. “Please turn your head.”

“I’m not that drunk,” Gavin replies. “The rain sobered me up.”

“Gav--”

“I came here to--” he cuts himself off, the thunder rumbling loud overhead. Enough of a sound to feel unsettling. It seems to silence Gavin completely and he looks away quickly, back to the window.

Connor leans forward, carefully pressing the bandages against his skin. A neat little row of them across the cut. It matches the curve of his jaw, almost. A swoop across his cheek. He’s lucky there isn’t any glass in his eye.

“Done,” he says, stepping away, clearing the counter of the trash and closing the kit up tight. “You should go to the hospital, though. You likely need antibiotics.”

“I’ll be fine.”

They both go silent, Gavin hesitating by the counter, Connor standing awkwardly in his never-used kitchen. Every cupboard in here is empty. There isn’t even a fridge. When Hank comes to visit, he orders food or eats before he comes. He has no use for this space. Just emptiness that he’s turned into a place to put books along the counter when they no longer fit on his shelves. It feels sterile and strange, sometimes. He wants to get more plants, ones that don't need as much sunlight as the others. Fill the space with life.

“Connor?”

He looks up from the counter, turning his attention away from inspecting the granite to avoid eye contact to Gavin as he steps down from the stool, making his way over to Connor slowly. He doesn’t move, even when Gavin is pressed closer than he has ever been before.

“I didn’t tell you why I came here.”

“Because you needed a friend to bandage you up?”

“No,” Gavin says quietly.

“Because Tina wasn’t available?”

“No,” he says again.

And there’s a hand, touching his waist, pulling him closer, and it is an impulsive reaction for him to lean down, resting his forehead against Gavin’s. He closes his eyes, feels Gavin’s breath against his face, feels the ghost of his lips touch his own.

_ No. _

“You’re drunk,” he says for the third time.

“I’m not that drunk,” Gavin repeats.

_ Still.  _ He's not exactly sober, either.

“Please,” Connor whispers. “Just… don’t.”

Gavin stays there for a moment, and Connor lets him. He doesn’t push him away, as much as part of him wants to. He doesn’t want to kiss someone for the first time when one of them has been in a bar before four o’clock. He doesn’t want to have someone kiss him and his body analyze the saliva before he can stop it and be told what types of alcohol he ingested.  But he doesn’t want Gavin to walk away yet either. It is painful, having him this close, feeling him against his body, holding onto him as if he’s the only thing keeping him standing straight up. He is both relieved and terribly, terribly hurt when Gavin pulls away from him, slipping out his arms, leaving the apartment with just the sound of his footsteps against the wooden floors.

 

 

He tries to read, tries to clean. Tries to spend his time with actions that will take his mind off of the fact that Gavin was here, standing that close to him, blood on his fingertips. He folds laundry, he reorganizes his bookshelves, he waters his plants--

But he keeps thinking about Gavin.

He lies down to sleep, closes his eyes tight and tries to shut off his thoughts for a little while to recharge but he thinks about what it might feel like to have Gavin lying in the bed beside him. If he had let Gavin kiss him, would he have stayed the night? Would Connor have lent him some clothes to wear? Would he have liked how Gavin looked in one of his hoodies?

It follows him in the morning, to work, back home again. Gavin stuck in his thoughts as he walks back to the apartment. He's not outside when Connor shows up. There's a sinking feeling in his chest, like if Gavin was at least waiting for him on the steps it would've changed everything. Somehow, it would've fixed the events of the previous day.

But he's not there.

 

There's a knock on his door at eight o'clock and he knows who it is before he even opens it.

“Hi," Gavin says, and he tries for a smile and fails rather miserably. He looks pained, as if Connor had slapped him.

"Hello," Connor returns, and it seems to be all he can manage.

They stand in silence for a moment, awkward and uncertain. Yesterday feels like a surreal experience. Something as impossible as Gavin trying to kiss him? It couldn't be real. But it was.  He was drunk and likely didn’t mean it, but he still tried to. It m ade Connor realize how much he wanted it, too. And now he’s terrified that they’re broken. Their strange friendship fractured when one of them made a stupid mistake. Connor can hide his feelings, but it’s never going to go back to how it was before. Maybe if they could vanish. Disappear more and more each day.  He doubts that, though. There’s a reason he likes Gavin. It doesn’t feel like a temporary thing. It feels purposeful.

“I’m sorry,” Gavin says quietly, breaking the silence. “About yesterday.”

“It’s okay.”

“It’s…” he shakes his head, his hands shoved into his pockets like he needs to do something with them. “I don’t know. I just… shouldn’t have done that.”

“Which part?”

“All of it.”

_ Of course not.  _ It would be a mistake to kiss him, wouldn’t it? They’ve been good at pretending, haven’t they? That Gavin wasn’t one of the people that hurt him before. That he isn’t one of the things Gavin despises the most. If Connor looks back at their conversations, he can almost see every point where he was wrong. He was wrong about Gavin moving closer and closer to him, wasn’t he? He was the one to take the few steps forward to him, Gavin was the one to stay. Connor was the one to keep the conversations going when Gavin should have left his side and gone back to his place.  He’s slowly convincing himself. Deconstructing moments he used to be so sure of and rebuilding them as this. Connor playing the part of an annoying boy desperate to not feel so alone. Gavin placating him time and time again.

But he can’t stop himself from speaking even as he regrets the words forming in his mouth--

“You don’t think you should have tried to kiss me?”

Gavin seems taken aback and he turns away a little bit, forcing his gaze from Connor’s face to the floor, “Look, I--I wasn’t drunk. But I wasn’t… sober. Or whatever. So.”

“So?”

“No. I don’t think I should have kissed you.”

“What about now?” he asks, and his voice is like a whisper. Cracked and broken and quiet because he can’t say the words as loud as he wants to. "You didn't drink today, did you?"

Gavin looks up, meeting his eyes and hesitating there and Connor realizes how stupid his question really was. How ridiculous he sounded asking him that. Almost like he was begging.

“D-Do you want me to?”

He doesn’t like a number of functions that the RK800 unit has. He doesn’t like being able to analyze certain things and be given information that haunts him. He doesn’t like spending nights remembering in perfect detail the depth and number of stab wounds in a body. He doesn’t like to replay the moments again and again when he was hurt and attacked and suffering.

But mostly--

Mostly, he doesn’t like this. The artificial blush they’ve given him. The way he can feel it creeping across his face or the slight rise in temperature like a human’s would. Connected with his emotions and his thoughts, knowing how embarrassed he is, how this question affects him. And he certainly doesn’t like the fact that Gavin is noticing it, that his lips are forming in a small lopsided smile that seems to make it only become worse.

“Can I?” Gavin asks.

He nods.

Once, short.

“I’ve never kissed anyone. I can’t tell you if it’d be any good.”

“We can find out then, can’t we?”

And then Gavin steps forward into the apartment. Filling it once again with his presence in a better way than he had before. Connor takes a step backward, hitting the edge of the kitchen counter, feeling a hand at his waist, steadying him, pulling him back to Gavin’s body. It is like it was before. Gavin close to him but not kissing him. Giving him a chance to run away if he wants to.

He doesn’t. He doesn’t say anything. He is quiet when Gavin’s hand comes up to his face, a careful caress across his cheek before resting lightly on the back of his neck, pulling him down.

The kiss is soft. Gavin’s lips are soft. It is barely anything at all at first, and then Gavin deepens it and Connor doesn’t know what to do or how to respond so he mimics him because he likes the feel of it. He likes how Gavin’s hand pulls him forward a little more, how close he is. He doesn’t want Gavin to go. He doesn’t want him to break it off.

But he does and Connor--

He’s stuck.

Lost in this strange in-between of thinking about everything and nothing all at once. He doesn’t let Gavin leave his arms. He holds onto him here, close by, needing the closeness and the comfort, needing to be able to steal another kiss if he wanted.

“So?” Connor asks, managing to find his words, forcing himself to say something. “Was I any good?”

“Better than I thought.”

He doesn’t know how to take that. If it's an insult or a compliment. But it makes him smile and it makes him laugh and Gavin smiles too and that’s really all he wants now. Seeing that stupid smile on his face.

“Can you do it again?”

Gavin nods, and when he leans forward and kisses Connor again, he’s still smiling and it feels like a light inside of him has been flicked on. He is tired of being pulled back and forth with every emotion there is but this wasn’t what he was expecting when Gavin knocked on his door. It wasn’t what he thought he would get when he watched the detective leave his apartment yesterday.

But he is glad he does get it. He’s glad that there is a moment of reprieve in the middle of all this grief.


	3. scars

Gavin likes his hands. He likes holding them and pressing kisses against his fingers and tracing the shape of scars on Connor’s palms. When Gavin comes over to visit him, it seems as though they never let go of one another. He doesn’t mind. He likes it, too. They were awkward and strange at first, trying to figure out how to exist in one another’s life as more than what they were before, but they found the rhythm easily. Two months and they have gone from hesitant kisses and tentative hand holding to this.  Gavin coming to his apartment after work, slipping inside of the apartment and pressing an annoying amount of kisses against his face. Laughing and smiling and holding onto Connor tight.  _ I missed you, I missed you, I missed you-- _ It's only been a day but  _Gavin_ _missed him._  

Connor thinks he might love him. He doesn’t know what love is, but when he thinks of Gavin he doesn’t feel like there are any words to really condense how he feels into something other than  _ love.  _ When he’s with Gavin, he sometimes forgets about his past. He forgots what their relationship was like when he was still a deviant. He forgets that he used to struggle to make jokes and act and be a person. Everything feels a little lighter when he has Gavin by his side. It seems impossible to think that once upon a time everything felt so weighed down and that, of all the people in his life, Gavin would help to uplift it.

It isn’t always easy.  He lays on the couch with Gavin close to him, tracing the scar on his palm, threading his fingers carefully through Connor’s, he looks up at him with curiosity, opens his mouth to say something that Connor knows he might not be able to respond to.

“What happened to your hand?”

_ What happened? _

“It’s just a scar.”

“How'd you get it?”

Connor weighs his options. Tilts them back and forth. If he was adamant about not responding, he’s sure Gavin would drop the subject. He’s seen scars on Gavin’s body, too. Hiding them under clothes, trying to camouflage them with ink. Tattoos that snake around his arms in some effort to draw the attention away from marks that, if Connor allowed himself to analyze he would find that they’ve been caused by things he knows Gavin doesn’t want to discuss.

But he also trusts Gavin. Not just with where the scars came from, not just with keeping it a secret from everyone else, but this layer of vulnerability. This raw and exposed nature of his soul. He trusts Gavin with that. It doesn't always mean he's ready to give every single detail about the things he did before, though.

“A WR400 stabbed me with a screwdriver,” he says. “At the Eden Club.”

“And the other one?”

He pulls his arm from where it helps support Gavin’s body, turning his palm so the scar catches the light. The other one was small, barely noticeable. This one is a longer, jagged edge. “A JB300.”

“I don’t know what that is.”

Connor smiles and turns to press a kiss against Gavin’s forehead, “We investigated Stratford Tower after Markus and the others sent their message. The JB300 androids worked there. One of them was a deviant.”

“And?”

“He stabbed me in the hand.”

“Asshole.”

He nods. Doesn’t go on to tell Gavin about how he pulled the Thirium regulator from his chest and tossed it aside. He doesn’t know if he’s quite capable of telling that part of the story yet. Crawling terrified and in pain towards it. Unable to scream, unable to get his voice loud enough for help. He wakes up sometimes with that nightmare haunting him and he has to test his voice to make sure it works right, has to suffocate a scream that he so badly wants to release just to make sure he still has the ability to call for help.

“Do you… do you have others?”

“Yes.”

They both wait in the silence, neither of them saying anything. Connor knows Gavin wants to see them. Hear the stories. Not out of some sick curiosity to see how close he was to being destroyed, how many times CyberLife patched him up and sent him out again, but simply wanting to know part of him. Get a little closer. Understand, maybe, why when the few times they’ve had sex, Connor has left his shirt on to cover all of the scars he can manage.

“Sit up,” Connor says quietly.

“Con--”

“Come on,” he says but he regrets it even as Gavin does what he says. Pulling away from him, leaving him lonely and a little cold on the couch where they separate. “You want to see, don’t you?”

“You don’t have to.”

“I know,” he says. “I wouldn’t unless…”

Unless he thought it would be okay. It isn’t necessarily the scars that bother him. He doesn’t mind telling the stories. Not always. It’s complicated. Sometimes they don’t bother him. Sometimes nothing about their presence on his body bothers him. Sometimes they do. Sometimes, he sees a glimpse of the one on his hand or feels Gavin leave a kiss against it and he can feel himself overwhelmed with guilt and the desire to run away.

Right now he’s okay.

So he pulls his shirt off, setting it aside, knowing that the number of them on his body is going to be surprising. He never died. He just got very, very close.  Gavin comes closer again, reaching out and tracing one on his arm. A long line. The first one he ever got. He tells the story in as little detail as he can. His first case. A PL600 taking a little girl hostage. The same thing he told Hank. Connor doesn’t lie about what happened, he just--

He doesn’t want Gavin to know that yet. How much of a failure he was. It feels weird to hold it so much against himself. How badly he did at his job when now he doesn’t even work as a detective and he hates CyberLife more than anything else in the world. It was the first time he ever felt pain. Out of all his scars, it’s the one that still hurts. Gavin's seen it before when Connor has stolen some of the shirts he leaves at Connor's apartment. He washes them and folds them, placing them in the drawers with the others. Wears it when Gavin comes over, lets him follow the shape of it with a gentle touch and press a kiss against it.

“And these?” Gavin asks, touching the smaller scars on his shoulders. A matching pair of small circles. “They from the WR400 too?”

“Yes,” he replies. “I wasn’t very good in that fight.”

“She kicked your ass.”

“She did,"  Connor reaches out and takes his hand, pulling it up to his face, letting Gavin’s fingers trace along his jaw.  “Do you feel that?”

Gavin tilts his head, his eyebrow raising, “Is your face dented?”

“A little, yes. She hit me with a metal tray. It did… more damage than expected.”

“She really fucking kicked your ass.”

He tries for a smile, but it’s difficult to fake one. He almost killed her.  He had his finger on the trigger. He was going to shoot. He isn’t that person now, but he once was, and it disgusts him to think of how cruel and ruthless he really was.

Connor moves his hands away, pull them towards his body, guiding them along his sides, across his abdomen. It would be sexual in any other circumstance, maybe. But here it isn’t. He doesn’t have very many visible scars from getting hit by the cars on that highway. Most of them are dents that were fixed as best and as quickly as CyberLife could manage. They don’t show up on his skin. If he were able to allow himself to let down his last wall and show Gavin his body without the skin, he might see them as how bad they actually look. But he can’t do that yet. He can only guide Gavin’s hands to the dips and curves in his body that aren’t meant to exist.

“What happened to you?”

“A highway is a dangerous place to be."

“You ran into the middle of a road?”

He shrugs and watches Gavin’s face shift. The attempt at humor to help diffuse the situation gone. He’s worried now, concerned for the person Connor used to be. When he put his life at stake because it didn’t matter. He could have died in any of those situations and it wouldn’t have mattered. It never would have mattered. He would have come back. It would’ve been fine.

“Connor--”

He holds onto Gavin’s hand a little tighter, moves it to a scar on his chest. A bullet wound. So close to killing him. So close to finally making him die, clearing his body of all the scars and starting again.

But he didn’t.

He lived, despite Gavin’s best efforts that night.

“I do forgive you,” he says quietly. “I hope you know that.”

“You aren’t going to wake up in the middle of the night and try to kill me for revenge?”

Connor smiles and shakes his head, “No. Never. Do you forgive me?”

“For what? Knocking me out? Of course I do. I deserved it.”

“Can you come here, then?”

“I am here,” Gavin says, with a small smile. But he isn't. He's so far away. It feels like he is too far away. 

“ _ Closer _ .”

Gavin smiles, softly, shifting his weight and moving back onto Connor’s lap. He pulls him close, wraps his arms around his body tightly. Gavin is leaving kisses against his forehead and his nose and his cheeks, tipping his chin up and placing them against his lips.

“I’m sorry,” Gavin says quietly. “For doing that to you.”

“It’s okay. I told you.”

“I know. I just--” he sighs. “I remember how fucking mean I was to you for no reason. I was a piece of shit.”

“You were.”

Gavin smiles, “I’m sorry. I wish I could go back and change it.”

“What would you do differently?”

“I don’t know. Not pull my gun on you?”

Connor laughs and leans forward, stealing another kiss. “It’s okay. I promise. People change.”

Gavin nods, “Thank you for letting me. You gave me a second chance and you… you shouldn’t have.”

“Why not?”

“Because now I’m in love with you and you’re never going to get rid of me.”

“Oh?” Connor says, and he can’t stop himself from smiling now. There’s not even a small part of him that’s faking it and it feels nice, after the tension of a few moments ago, Gavin has erased it so easily. “You’re in love with me?”

“No. What? Who said that? I’ll beat their fucking ass.”

Connor presses his face against Gavin’s neck, trying to hide the smile, trying to hide the laugh, trying to smother his words. “I love you, too.”

“Thank fucking God,” Gavin whispers, and he sounds genuinely relieved. Maybe he is. Words like  _ I love you  _ said accidentally has that effect on people, Connor supposes. “I didn’t mean to say that.”

“But you mean it?”

“Yeah. Of course I do. And I was serious about that last part, too. You’re not going to get rid of me.”

“I don’t want to.”

And he doesn’t. Truly. He’s going to hold onto Gavin just as tightly. Make it just as difficult for him to get rid of Connor as it will be for Connor to lose Gavin. 


	4. death

He watches it happen almost in slow-motion. It starts off quiet--Gavin walking through the streets, nothing but the ambiance of the city. Cars and people talking, the sun setting or rising in the distance. Connor can’t really tell. He isn’t paying attention to the sky, his focus is on Gavin.

Then, it happens. Guns firing. People shouting, screaming. Pedestrians cower and Gavin runs for cover against the nearest car, bullets hitting the side of it in a flurry. It’s so loud. Overtaking everything else. Overtaking the quiet peaceful part of the street before.

There’s more than one person shooting at him and Connor is sitting here doing absolutely nothing to help. Just watching like the useless person he is. He winces when Gavin exits the cover, pulling a gun up to shoot back. There’s too many of them, and only one of him. The bullets hit him easily. A hundred times over. Mutilating his body, spreading red against the cement.

_“Fuck.”_

Gavin tosses the controller on the table as the screen turns gray and informs him that he’s died. In a few seconds, it will reload and he’ll be walking around the streets of San Francisco again as if it never happened.

“You should’ve been more prepared,” Connor says, although, he doesn’t actually have any tips to offer. He’s only watched Gavin play the game in bits and pieces. He doesn’t know any mechanics in the game, he barely knows the plot, barely knows the characters. He doesn’t know how it works, he just likes having Gavin here, on the couch beside him. Legs draped over his lap, leaned against the armrest with a book propped in front of him. Being close to him without having to force a conversation.

“Yeah? Next time I’ll buy a grenade launcher and just annihilate the fuckers.”

“Sounds like a good idea.”

He watches Gavin smile, “It’s about stealth, you know. I’m supposed to be sneaky.”

“Well, you’re doing a terrible job at that.”

“You think you can do better?”

“I think anybody could do better.”

“Oh, fuck you. Now you’re gonna get it.”

“Wh--”

Gavin moves quick. Faster in real life than he had in the game. More dexterity, more impulsively, more successfully. He pulls at Connor, sliding him down from against the couch so he’s laying flat against the cushions and pinning him underneath Gavin's body. It takes little time for Gavin to lean forward and start kissing him. Pecks against his neck and cheek, muttering something about how rude Connor is.

Hank asked him once what would happen if he died. He meant what would happen to Connor if his body was destroyed, not necessarily how it would feel, Connor thinks. He talked about the afterlife, and at the time, Connor assumed nothing. He assumed an empty black void. The opposite of the bright light humans always talk about. He thought it would be cold. Not temperature wise but--

 _Feeling_. The lack of warmth, the lack of love. Cold and sterile. Everything gutted out and nothing left behind. Mechanical. Not even a little bit of care taken when the angel took his soul away, if even those exist, if he would even be blessed by an angel instead of pulled down and torn apart by a demon. He doesn’t know. He thinks about it a lot. He never died but he got very, very close. That's enough to make him wonder. If he could be alive right now and know what it would feel like to die.

He thought he knew what it might feel like. Emptiness all around him. Floating along some endless space, always hoping he’d bump into someone else but never, ever managing it.

But he hopes it’s like this. Warm and happy and comfortable. Someone he loves tackling him against the couch and teasing him, finding all the spots on his body that, for lack of a better word, make him ticklish. Forcing out a laugh he can't hide. Kissing him and making him smile. Holding him close, telling him he loves him. It isn’t necessarily this moment he wants to be his afterlife, although, he would probably accept the rest of his eternity being spent with Gavin dying in a video game and burrowing his way against his chest. He’d happily accept that. But the feeling of this moment.

Being loved. Feeling so full of joy and hope and happiness--

That’s what he’d like the afterlife to be.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> it's short and i refuse to apologize for that.  
> (but also i'm sorry it's so short lkjsdfjklkjlfdg)


	5. gavin's place

Connor has never been to Gavin’s place. They're always at his apartment. It’s amusing, sometimes. Watching Gavin wander around the space, finding new jokes to make about the clutter of plants and books. Commenting that his cats would try and eat them or climb up on his shelves. He tries to press, sometimes, only making small offhanded comments or jokes. Curiosity getting the best of him. Not really born from wanting to know what Gavin’s place looks like but more so why Gavin keeps him from it. When they meet up after work, Gavin grabs his hand and leads him up to Connor’s door, past the floor he lives on. Connor will glance backward, wondering if he tugged on Gavin’s hand and forced him in the opposite direction if he’d allow it.

He doesn’t. Gavin didn’t push him on certain subjects and he doesn’t plan to go back on that. But he wonders. How often have they kissed outside of Connor’s door or slept in his apartment? How many mornings has he woken up to Gavin leaving him, pressing kisses against his face and saying goodbye so he can return to his place for clothes or the cats?

Gavin is running, he thinks. It feels like he is running away. Pulling from Connor’s side and putting a barrier between them. He doesn’t know what happened. He doesn’t know if he did something wrong. There are just too little mornings when Connor can wake up and know that Gavin will stay there and linger in the bed with him. Letting Connor curl up close to him, be held tight against his chest so he feels safe. Like precious cargo.

_ Don’t let me go. _

  
  


“I have to tell you something, Connor.”

He folds in on himself, bringing his legs up, hiding his body underneath the blankets and the sheets. Mentally and physically preparing himself for whatever follows. Those words are never good. They always allude to something terrible. He watches Gavin move across the bedroom, setting his watch down on the dresser, slipping his jacket off and hanging it on the hook at the back of the door. A belt unbuckled and slipped from its loops and set aside. Simple acts of readying to turn in for the night.

He isn’t making eye contact with Connor. Not like he usually does. There are always two different ways Gavin looks at him before they go to sleep. Glances through the mirror, small smiles wrapped up with a story about the day or complaints about aches in his bones that Connor tries his best to get rid of.  Or, turned around, watching Connor with the look in his eyes that says he wants to stay up for a little bit longer. Make a mess of the sheets. Make a mess of the both of them.  But this is different. Even if it wasn’t for the tone in his voice, Connor can tell by how little he looks up from his actions that it’s serious.

And so his head races through every single option it can before he can find the words to ask him what he means. If this is going to be a confession that this has all just been fun and games. If Gavin’s done something terrible. If something tragic has happened with a family or friend.

“W-What is it?”

“I don’t think I lied to you,” Gavin says, switching his jeans for pajamas. “But I think you might’ve… I don’t know. Got the wrong impression?”

“Impression of  _ what?” _

“Con--” Gavin moves over to the bed, reaching out to touch his face. He reacts involuntarily, pulling away quickly. “It’s--”

“You’re scaring me.” He’s thinking too much of Gavin telling him that there’s someone else. That Connor got the wrong impression of their relationship. That even if they said they loved each other they never really made it officially. Connor never asked him to be his boyfriend, he never asked him to be committed to this, to  _ him.  _ They never specified that they were going to be exclusive.  He’s thinking that Gavin is going to tell him he’s been with other people. One or a thousand it doesn’t matter. It’s just a new fear that he didn’t know he had before. Spiking up, taking over.

“I’m sorry, it's nothing--It's nothing _bad._ ” Gavin says quietly. “I was just going to say I don’t… live here.”

“What?”

“I don’t live in this building.”

“What?”

“My residence is--”

“I know what you’re saying, Gavin,” he says, reaching forward and pushing his shoulder. A small shove of revenge. “What’s wrong with you? Why'd you have to be so dramatic about it?”

“I’m sorry,” he repeats, and he’s smiling a little bit. “I--”

“You were stalking me?” Connor asks, the words starting to sink in. He watches Gavin shake his head, letting him move closer again, letting him pull Connor from where he sits and into his lap. The touches along his side, moving delicately along his spine--

They’re little apologies. One after the other. A quiet  _ I’m sorry  _ for causing Connor’s panic. Maybe he should apologize, too. He was caught up in how good they are together. How happy they can be. Overreacting because of the possibility of one thing going wrong.

“I hate you,” he whispers, like Gavin sometimes does to him. And Gavin laughs, pressing a trail of kisses against his neck, pulling him closer like Connor always replies. “You stalked me.”

“I didn’t stalk you. Tina lives here. I only ever saw you because I came to see her or take care of her dog.”

“Stalker,” Connor mumbles again.

“Con?”

“What?”

“I love you.”

He smiles, a little bit, but he is terrified of his overreaction. Terrified that if he were to ever actually lose Gavin--

He doesn’t really know how or if he could recover.

  
  


“You want to see my place?” Gavin asks. His arms are wrapped around Connor’s waist, impeding with his ability to fold the laundry properly. “I can take you there.”

“I can meet your cats?”

“Yeah.”

“Okay. Only for the cats, though.”

There’s a kiss placed against the back of his shoulder, “I figured as much.”

  
  


Gavin’s place isn’t messy, but it isn’t clean. Cluttered but organized piles of things that need to be put back away again. Blankets tossed haphazardly on the couch, magazines and books in precarious stacks on the coffee table. Laundry left unfolded in a basket where a cat has made a bed. He supposes that explains how there is always cat fur stuck to Gavin's clothes.

“This,” he says, leaning down to pet the cat, not pulling her from the bed, not even waking her as he pets the top of her head. “Is Cappucino. All she does is sleep and eat.”

“Cappucino?” he asks. He’s heard the names before when they’ve talked, but never questioned it before.

“It’s a family name.”

“Oh, I see,” Connor says with a small smile. “And Latte?”

Gavin stands up, moving toward the window, pulling back the curtain. The cat on the other side turns to face him looking almost annoyed. White and fluffy, splotches of soft brown on her fur.

“Bird killer, if you let her out.”

“She’s cute.”

“She’s vicious.”

He nods, acting as though he believes it. He’s heard the stories. He’s seen pictures of the cats on Gavin’s phone. Interspersed with pictures of him. Sleeping or sitting on the couch.  _ Stalker.  _ Not that Connor can’t say he doesn’t have pictures of Gavin saved. He looks peaceful when he’s asleep. Cute and soft. Things he doesn’t want to forget. Things he didn't think Gavin was really entirely capable of when they first met.

But he feels awkward now. He’s never been here before. Gavin avoided bringing him to this place like the plague. Brought over his gaming systems and controllers, rehomed them in Connor’s living room to avoid even that. The atmosphere feels weird. As comfortable as he can be with Gavin at his own place or out in public, things are different here. Somewhere he wasn't allowed before. He doesn't know what to do with this freedom now.

“You okay?”

He nods, knowing it’s a lie, but not wanting to admit the truth. “Why didn’t you want me to come here?”

Gavin shrugs, moving closer to his side again, an arm slipping around his waist, “It’s stupid, so you can’t laugh at me.”

“Okay. I won’t.”

“Promise?”

“Promise.”

“When we first started….” he trails off, still tentative to use the word  _ friendship.  _ He’s heard Gavin talk about it before. His inability to describe it as such. Connor understands what he means. There isn’t really a word for what they were. Not quite friends. More and less than that at the same time. He doesn’t know if they could exist as friends. “I knew you thought I lived there. And… it just never came up in conversation for me to tell you otherwise and I thought it’d be… I don’t know. Stupid? To tell you? The longer it went on… the more ridiculous it felt that I’d never corrected you before.”

“You sneak away every morning to go to the opposite side of town. I could’ve been staying the night here with you and saving you the trip.”

“I like your place. It’s very green.”

Connor smiles and shakes his head, “You’re stupid.”

"I'm well aware." Gavin kisses him, arms moving upwards, hands pulling him down.  “You know... you haven’t seen my bedroom yet.”

“I have a feeling you’re going to keep me in there for a while if I do.”

Gavin shrugs again, pulling away, threading his fingers through Connor’s. “Maybe. Is that okay with you?”

He nods, letting Gavin lead him away towards the bedroom. Tiny and cramped, a large bed unmade. Dark blue sheets, plaid pillowcases. He doesn’t really pay attention to the rest. Gavin is kissing him, pulling him down against the bed, moving a hand up underneath his shirt.

They’ve had sex before. Plenty of times. He knows this is a little bit different. Or maybe it’s just the nerves in his stomach, telling him that it’s separate from all the times before. The first time after he showed Gavin his scars, the first time in this apartment. It's different.  It’s quiet. The feeling of it. A tenderness and a peaceful aspect of it. Something that feels easy. Not complex and messy. It never has. Their relationship has always felt like it was easy. No forcing themselves to change. No trying to be someone they aren’t. Forgiving and growing together, despite the anxiety and Connor’s inexperience regarding this.

Gavin is wonderful. Perfect, he thinks. Soft and kind. Different to who he thought he was so long ago.

When he first met him, Connor didn’t know he could love this much, that he could love  _ Gavin  _ this much. It's funny and amusing, almost, to think about how different they both are. How foolish he was before.

  
  


He wakes in the bed, registering his surroundings slowly. Gavin against his chest, legs tangled together, blanket pulled around them tight. There’s a cat curled against the curve of his legs, another one stretched out against on the mattress beside Gavin.  Connor smiles, leaving a kiss against the top of Gavin’s head. Gavin moves, just a little bit, snuggling closer to Connor in his sleep and the arm around his waist tightening.

He likes this. This bed. This room. Messy and cluttered. Organized but distraught. Two cats and his boy, quietly sleeping away the morning. Not running from the bed but _staying._

He thinks he’ll stay over more often.


End file.
